The island is named after a story. In the ancient poem about the Argonauts, the crew were sailing back from Crete when the sky went completely dark. The god Apollo raised his bow and light spread across the sea. An island appeared where there had been nothing, and they anchored there. Anaphe means, roughly, revealed. To thank him, they built a temple to Apollo Aigletes — Apollo of the light.

What you can see today

The foundations of that temple lie under the Monastery of Zoodochos Pigi, on the low strip of land at the foot of Kalamos. Ancient stone blocks and inscriptions are visible in the monastery walls and courtyard.

Inland, the ancient city on the Kastelli hill still has parts of its walls and a cemetery with large stone tombs. Beside a chapel stands a Roman sarcophagus carved with Medusa, Perseus and Pegasus; the chapel itself was built from stones taken from the tomb.

You can still walk sections of the Iera Odos, the paved ancient road that linked the city to the temple.

Anafi in Athens

In the middle of the nineteenth century, stonemasons and carpenters from Anafi came to Athens to work on the rebuilding of the city and on King Otto's palace. They built their own houses on the northeast slope below the Acropolis, in the style of their own island. Other Cycladic craftsmen joined them. The quarter is still called Anafiotika.

Chora is built inland, at 260 metres, where you cannot see it from the sea. This protected it from pirates.

What makes Chora different from other Cycladic capitals is the shape of its houses. They are single rooms with curved, barrel-shaped roofs, called kamares, packed tightly along stepped lanes. A small Venetian castle stands at the top of the village. At sunset you can see the outline of Santorini on the horizon. A road runs around the back, so there are no cars in the centre.

Until recently the only way down to the harbour was a mule track. The path is still there, two kilometres long, and people still walk it.

Below, Agios Nikolaos is the port and the second settlement on the island: a few tavernas, some rooms and the ferry quay, pressed between cliffs. A third small group of buildings has grown up behind Klisidi beach. That is the whole of settled Anafi.

Kalamos dominates the island. It is a limestone rock 460 metres high at the eastern tip, and you can see it from almost everywhere. The rock and the coast around it are protected under Natura 2000, for their plants and rock formations.

Climbing to the chapel

The walk to the chapel on top starts at the lower monastery. It is about 2.5 kilometres long and climbs 370 metres, which takes an hour to an hour and a quarter.

Many people walk up in the dark to reach the top at sunrise, and some sleep there. The rock creates its own weather: it is often windy, and it can be covered in cloud on a day that is clear everywhere else.

Other walks

On the north side of Kalamos is Drakontospilo, the dragon's cave. Its entrance is more than ten metres high, and water runs down the inside walls into natural pools. You can only reach it on foot, and the path is rough.

Vigla, at 579 metres, is the highest point on the island. About eighteen kilometres of marked paths connect all of these places.

Almost all the beaches are on the southeast coast. The north side is steep and has very few. None of them have sunbeds or umbrellas.

Klisidi is closest to the port, fifteen to twenty minutes on foot. It is sandy, with tamarisk trees for shade and two places to eat behind it. Camping there was banned by residents a few years ago.

Roukounas is the longest beach, about three hundred metres, with a tamarisk grove and a taverna. Camping is tolerated here, and part of the beach is used by naturists. In August it is the busiest beach on Anafi — which is still very quiet.

Katsouni is fifteen minutes east of Klisidi along the path. It is smaller and quieter, with the same character.

Agioi Anargyroi has no taverna at all. Carry water.

In summer the bus goes to the southeastern beaches, and small boats leave the port for bays that have no road.

Kalamos is one of the most serious climbing sites in the Aegean. The rock is compact limestone, the faces are between two hundred and more than four hundred metres high, and the routes start close to the water.

The first route was opened in 1999, on the south-southwest face. A fully bolted route of 435 metres followed in 2008, and a new route on the southeast face in 2023. This is difficult and committing climbing, for experienced parties — not somewhere to try the sport for the first time.

Apart from climbing, the sea is for swimming and snorkelling. There is no diving centre on the island. Small boats run day trips from the harbour to beaches you cannot reach by road, and in season there are boats across to Santorini.

Saffron grows wild on Anafi. Nobody plants it, and it appears throughout the local cooking — in the cheese bread that is the island's speciality, and in meat dishes, pies and cured pork.

Beekeeping is the main farming activity here, and thyme honey comes from dozens of small producers.

Sweets to take home

Melitera are small open cheese pies made with fresh mizithra, eggs and sugar.

Koufeto is honey with peeled almonds, and it is the traditional wedding sweet.

Xerotigana are thin sheets of fried pastry served with honey and sesame.

On the savoury side, ballothia and pitaria are two kinds of hand-cut pasta, dried in the sun and served simply with tomato and grated cheese. Cheese kept in olive oil, and good local olive oil, complete a short but genuinely local list.